stupid PST timezone, i'll have to be back awake @ 6am to catch the start of the bikes. good luck everyone, i'll be catching up with the webventure.br photos as soon as they start posting something from the race, as usual.

I think one of the most interesting parts of my website is "monitor.trackingdakar.nl". Most of you probably already experienced how hard it has always been to follow Dakar on small screens like mobile phones or tablets. On the other side it's also hard to optimize a website for all these different devices with different resolutions and browsers. I want to try to make things a bit easier or at least clarify the overview a bit for smaller devices. Of course this has some side effect: maybe you like the old overview more? Because it costs a lot of time to rewrite all pages I decided to start with the "monitor". I hope you like the idea behind it and I'm curious after your experiences. I'm to busy right now to follow the forum and other social media, but I would love to share it with you.

On high resolution (HD) it will show everything like you are used to. On lower resolution columns dissapear, but most important information is still there. Maybe you should play a bit with the page size and check how it looks on mobiles or tablets. I think you will get used to it quite fast.

If you don't like the dissapearing of the columns and want to switch back to the old view you can switch back easily by clicking the ">>" button on the right. You can then switch back with the "<
When (timing) columns dissapear you will see 2 columns at the end of the table with "Time" and "Pos". These are the times and positions on the last checkpoint or waypoint where the drivers passed. You probably noticed the grey header with a waypoint name: that's the last specific waypoint.

Enjoy the new page and I hope you like it! Have fun and please be patient the coming hours while I try to get and keep things up and running.

Best regards,
Mischa

UPDATE: I hope you are using new browsers, because these new features must be incompatible with older browsers. If this is a problem I will put the old version of the monitor there aswell.

But let's not forget the riders in the lower positions - the names we may not recognise but who have spent years planning, fundraising and struggling to just get to the start line and to achieve the Dakar dream. The Malle Moto 'DIY' riders with no team backup on the event. The ones arriving at the bivouac in darkness and getting a few hours sleep before setting off battered and tired before dawn the next day.

In my book these are the true heroes of the Dakar

Wishing all the competitors and teams out in South America a safe ride !

We are getting down to just one hour away from the DSS of SS1, as mentioned in the last couple of f5irehose pages there are several ways of f5ollowing the competitors progress during the SPECIALS with interval and stage times for the various CP's and multiple ways to track those riders (or clasification of riders) that you are interested in, using both the Dakar.com POSIS (CP times), the Dakar.com "live" GPS map or Mischas formidable tracker. But there IS NO "Irritrack" graphic GPS tracker overlay that can be followed - as is used on many other rallies... THIS is Dakar tracking old school - no visual representation.

Now if any (or all) of the above is Greek to you... please familiarize yourself with this old chestnut thread and it will help explain the basics, some terminology etc.